Andersonville Restaurant Week

[dorchadas]

So the original plan was that wanderluster_kp was going to come into town to see us and Laila and we would all go out to a restaurant for Andersonville Autumn Restaurant Week. Then wanderluster_kp's appointment was cancelled so she didn't come to Chicago, so Poppa and Nana didn't come into the city either, but sashagee still had a couple places she wanted to try out, so we made sure to do that this weekend.

On Friday, we didn't have a lot of time, but after work we went down to Bar Roma for dessert. sashagee wanted their pistachio cake that they were serving for their set menu and I wanted the tiramisu, so we took the long walk--sashagee thought it was much closer than it actually was--down and asked if they served the pistachio cake separate from the restaurant week set menu. It turned out that they did, we got them and walked home, and right when we got home I had to leave to go to Shabbat services so I didn't get to try the cake at all until later. It was classic tiramisu, but with the addition of a wafer cookie over the top of it that added some crunch. Delicious.

I did not take a picture of the tiramisu, but today we went to Fiya for dinner and that I did take pictures of:

House-made hummus with crispy chickpeas and za'atar olive oil

This was Laila's favorite meal entirely because of the pita. sashagee gave her a bunch of hummus and even one of the egg halves, and while she took a bit of hummus, she didn't eat any of the egg. She just kept asking for more and more pita and when the waiter asked if we wanted even more pita, she said yes. The girl knows what she wants.

House greens, watermelon radish, jalapeño, pickled red onion, dates, ricotta salata, croutons, fig vinaigrette

I only got a picture of this after sashagee dug into it and gave some to Laila and herself. It was pretty good but there's only so much you can say about most salads and this isn't one of the ones you can say a lot about. Nothing really stood out about it to me, though Laila loved all the cucumbers and ate a ton of them. I happily gave most of mine to her since she left the rest of it to me. Even the cheese!

Smoked whitefish beignets, charred onion cream, pickled onion, dill

I was the only one who ate these and they were delicious. The onion cream was amazing, mixing perfectly with the slightly sweet beignet and the fish. I told sashagee that they were basically gefiltefish dumplings, and since I'm one of the people who actually likes gefiltefish a lot, even the jarred stuff. I was happy that Laila apparently filled up on bread and didn't want these, because that meant more for me. I did save some of the cream for later, though.

Batata harra smashed fingerling potatoes, sumac, aleppo pepper, olive oil, lemon

To use here. I wasn't super hungry, and Laila wasn't hungry, and sashagee had an entire course of her own coming so she didn't eat many potatoes either. Most of them ended up on a box to be taken home, but I had a couple with some of the leftover cream from the beignets and some of the yogurt from the next course and they were good. They're roasted potatoes, so they're never going to be super-amazing, but they're a solid side and that's how they were here.

Half ivory chicken, confit & roast, red zhug, preserved lemon yogurt

I was eating dairy so I didn't eat this, and so I have nothing to say about. But I did steal some of the yogurt after sashagee told me how good it was and I put it on my potatoes, and she was right--it was delicious.

Pavlova Meringue, praline, passion fruit purée, mint-cardamom crème anglaise

I wanted the cheesecake, but sashagee successfully convinced me that since one of Laila's favorite episodes of Bluey is the Pavlova one, we should get the pavlova so she could try it. Well, having done so it, was...okay? The meringue was so stiff that I literally had to chip away at it with my spoon, and while that did prevent it from being squishy--probably my least favorite texture--it was still weird to eat. The cardamon sauce on top was delicious, as was the fruit purée, but I still can't help think that I would have preferred to get the cheesecake. At least Laila really liked the pavlova.


There's a couple other restaurants that we wanted to go to but didn't get to hit. Hopefully they do this again next year!